There’s a version of me that feels like static.

Not loud enough to be heard.
Not quiet enough to be ignored.
Just… there. Interfering.

Like every room I walk into has to adjust around me, even if no one says it out loud.
Like people don’t push me away, they just slowly stop pulling me closer.

And maybe that’s worse.

Because at least rejection is honest.
Silence just lets your mind fill in the blanks.

And my mind is very good at that.

It tells me I’m the extra weight.
The wrong mood at the wrong time.
The person people deal with instead of choose.

And the dangerous part isn’t how dramatic those thoughts sound.
It’s how reasonable they start to feel after a while.

Like I can trace the logic.
Point to the moments.
Build a quiet little case against myself that no one else even knows exists.

I don’t always trust my own reactions.
Sometimes my brain twists things sideways and I follow it anyway, knowing I’ll regret it later.

It’s exhausting being both the problem and the one stuck dealing with it.

People say “just be yourself” like that’s a simple instruction.
Like “yourself” isn’t a moving target.
Like it doesn’t come with sharp edges some days.

So I stay.
Not because I feel solid.
Not because I feel understood.
Just because leaving everything behind isn’t something you undo if you’re wrong.

And I’ve been wrong before.

So I sit in it.

In the static.
In the noise that doesn’t quite become silence.
In the version of me that feels like too much and not enough at the same time.

And for now… that’s where I exist.